Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages: Third EditionCutts, Edward Lewes
History
Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages: Third Edition
Cutts, Edward Lewes
Civilization, Medieval; Middle Ages -- Social life and customs
Representations of the pope occur not infrequently in ancient paintings.
His costume is that of an archbishop, only that instead of the usual mitre
he wears a conical tiara. In later times a cross with three crossbars has
been used by artists as a symbol of the pope, with two crossbars of a
patriarch, and with one crossbar of an archbishop; but Dr. Rock assures us
that the pope never had a pastoral staff of this shape, but of one
crossbar only; that patriarchs of the Eastern Church used the cross of two
bars, but never those of the Western Church; and that the example of
Thomas-à-Becket with a cross of two bars, in Queen Mary's Psalter (Royal,
2 B. vii.) is a unique example (and possibly an error of the artist's). A
representation of Pope Leo III. from a contemporary picture is engraved in
the "Annales Archæologique," vol. viii. p. 257; another very complete and
clear representation of the pontifical costume of the time of Innocent
III. is engraved by Dr. Rock ("Church of our Fathers," p. 467) from a
fresco painting at Subiaco, near Rome. Another representation, of late
thirteenth-century date, is given in the famous MS. called the "Psalter of
Queen Mary," in the British Museum (Royal, 2 B. vii.); there the pope is
in nothing more than ordinary episcopal costume--alb, tunic, chasuble,
without the pall--and holds his cross-staff of only one bar in his right
hand, and his canonical tiara has one crown round the base. Beside him
stands a bishop in the same costume, except that he wears the mitre and
holds a crook. A good fourteenth-century representation of a pope and
cardinals is in the MS. August. V. f. 459. We give a woodcut of the
fifteenth century, from a MS. life of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick,
in the British Museum (Julius E. iv. f. 207); the subject is the
presentation of the pilgrim earl to the pope, and it enables us to bring
into one view the costumes of pope, cardinal, and bishop. A later picture
of considerable artistic merit may be found in Hans Burgmair's "Der Weise
König," where the pope, officiating at a royal marriage, is habited in a
chasuble, and has the three crowns on his tiara.
[Illustration: _Pope, Cardinal, and Bishop._]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account